Having devoted a major part of my working life over the past four years to researching and writing about terrorism, I am alert to the possibility that there are a few people around me who would like to shut me up—for good, if at all possible.  The tragic end of Theo van Gogh, slaughtered in the best jihadist tradition in Amsterdam last fall, indicates the reality of that threat and the need for preparedness: There but for the grace of God go I!  As I was leaving for the Balkans on July 1, however, I was ill prepared for the possibility that someone in the land of my birth would accuse me of being a would-be terrorist, of plotting assassinations of high officials and issuing mortal threats.

When Amb. James Bissett, Prof. Ronald Hatchett, and I accepted an invitation to give public lectures in Montenegro in early July as guests of the Movement for the Common State of Serbia and Montenegro, we knew that what we had to say would not be welcomed by the separatist government of Prime Minister Milo Djukanovic.  Knowing that passions are running high in this deeply divided land, we were careful to make sure that what we said was reasonable and true.

Arriving in the wake of countless foreign “experts” who had supported the cause of Montenegrin separatism, we believed it both proper and necessary to present an alternative perspective.  In four hectic days, we and our colleagues from Greece and Russia presented a total of seven panels in Podgorica (twice), Niksic, Budva, Bar, Kotor, and Herceg Novi.

Ambassador Bissett’s focus was on the Canadian legislation for any future referendum on the independence of Quebec.  In a normal debate, his detailed account of Canada’s Clarity Act would have been welcomed by all parties as a valuable contribution to the issue of who should have the right to vote in a referendum, what exact question should be asked, and what constitutes a “clear majority.”

Professor Hatchett’s parallel between various dangers facing an independent Montenegro and the sobering experience of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia in the first decade of her independence was based on an informed and insightful analysis of the dynamics that are at work in both places.  In particular, Dr. Hatchett pointed out that the threat of greater Albanian chauvinism—which has already turned one third of Macedonia into an area effectively ungovernable from Skopje—would not spare Montenegro.  If the state of Texas, with her 24 million people, a powerful economy, and the legal right to secede, realized the peril of independent statehood in an uncertain world (Dr. Hatchett concluded), it would be advisable for tiny Montenegro, with her 650,000 people earning $200 per month on average, to think twice before separating.

My own presentation was focused on the experience of two small but culturally and historically important European nations that inhabit clearly defined countries but do not enjoy sovereign statehood.  Neither Catalonia nor Scotland is deprived of any element of meaningful nationhood by virtue of being in a common state with other nations that share similar geopolitical and economic interests.  The dynamics of their social, economic, and political development are not impeded from Madrid or London, which is proved by the failure of separatists to capture a significant segment of the vote in either country.  I was also careful to point out that the intention of the Montenegrin government to exclude its citizens resident in Serbia—one third of the electorate!—from the referendum was unacceptable under international democratic standards, most recently exemplified by the participation of French and Dutch citizens resident abroad in the referendum on the E.U. constitution last May.

The reaction of the overwhelmingly government-controlled media in Podgorica to our efforts was depressingly predictable.  To give you some flavor of the place, on only one day (July 6) the leading pro-government daily Vijesti compared us to a bunch of Mein Kampf-reading thugs in a Munich beer hall in the early 1930’s; Pobjeda accused us of performing for a small fistful of dollars; while Prime Minister Djukanovic himself stated that he did not mind our visit because, in his view, our musings would only strengthen the cause of independence.

Someone did mind, however.  One day after our departure from Podgorica, a pro-Djukanovic weekly, Nedjeljni zurnal, published a banner front-page headline “Prime Minister Threatened From Chicago,” followed by a two-page feature focusing on a forged letter in which I was supposed to have threatened to kill Milo Djukanovic’s children and then the leader himself.  This was an obvious attempt to shut me up.  The story was untrue, of course, but the “letter” was there, in black and white, accompanied by a recent photograph of me.  As Tom Fleming commented in his Hard Right! column on our website a few days later,

It seems incredible, but let us remember who Milo Djukanovic is: a notoriously corrupt Montenegrin political leader, who has been denounced by Italian officials for his active role in a massive tobacco smuggling ring.  When at least one of his alleged business partners was willing to talk, he was gunned down.  More recently, Montenegro has become a safe haven for Russian mafiosi and international hoodlums of every description.  At the same time, Djukanovic has been orchestrating a Montenegrin separatist movement that would, by making him head of an independent state, give him virtual immunity from prosecution . . . If Djukanovic were a serious dictator, like Stalin, he might have hired a competent American or European forger to produce his document.  Instead, he relied on local talent.  They did not bother to get Rockford Institute or Chronicles letterhead, but manufactured one for Srdja Trifkovic, Politologicus, Chicago plus a zip code—they could not even find out his address.

Contrary to the advice of Dr. Fleming and many other friends and associates, I immediately decided to go back to Podgorica, the capital of Djukanovic’s fiefdom, to hold a press conference and challenge the authorities either to arrest me or to admit that the allegations were false.  I sent a letter to Djukanovic, inviting him to denounce the allegations, especially since the article claimed that his cabinet was the source of the forged letter.

In view of another paranoid article that appeared in the far more influential, semi-official Pobjeda daily on Saturday, July 9, claiming that a detailed plan to instigate violence in Montenegro is being masterminded from Chicago, it became obvious that the accusations against me were not an isolated incident: They reflected a sustained campaign.  I was encouraged by the public outcry on both sides of the Atlantic: Under the circumstances, publicity was my best insurance policy.  Milo’s henchmen were making a mistake by believing that I would be intimidated into staying away from their turf.  The manner in which they reacted reflected their nervousness, even panic.  I knew that the slanderers did not expect me to turn up and would be caught flatfooted.  I also knew that nothing short of my turning up in Podgorica and throwing down the gauntlet would get sufficient media coverage to shut them up, once and for all.

The invitation to the press conference was circulated by the Movement for the Common State between 1 and 2 P.M. on Monday.  Between 3 and 4 P.M., while completing some letters at the Bishop’s office in Trebinje (Herzegovina), I received a call on my cell phone (ID withheld, of course) with a short but clear message: “Trifkovic, you may come to Montenegro, but you won’t get out of it!”  They were getting either desperate or desperately serious, but this call merely caused a surge of inat that made my decision to go irreversible.

The trip went without a hitch.  At the border, I was met by a couple of friends from Podgorica who drove ahead.  Just before Niksic, we had to stop as a herd of sheep crossed the road.  They called me on my cell: “That’s a DPS [Djukanovic’s ruling party] youth wing trying to sabotage our trip,” they commented.

At 10 A.M., before a room packed with the entire press corps of Podgorica, I read the following statement:

I am addressing you today to refute scandalous allegations which we all know to be untrue.  By printing what it has printed, the Weekly Journal (Nedjeljni zurnal) has earned for itself the distinction of being the most noxious publication in today’s Europe.  There is nothing comparable to it; for similarities we’d need to look several decades back, to the Voelkische Beobachter or Zeri i Populit.  Perhaps there is a paper equally bad to be found in Pyongyang, or Khartoum, or Riyadh, I don’t know.

 

I am especially concerned that the Nedjeljni zurnal and the Pobjeda daily have had the audacity to accuse my homeland, America, of harboring would-be assassins and terrorists.  If such plans to murder the prime minister of Montenegro emanate from Chicago, as the Nedjeljni zurnal alleges, if an elaborate conspiracy to cause destabilization and instigate violence in Montenegro are being hatched there, as Pobjeda claims, and the FBI and other services tolerate such behavior and fail to arrest the culprits, this is a serious accusation against the authorities of the United States, an accusation that must be supported by evidence or else admitted to be fabricated.

By slandering America, by accusing it of tolerating terrorism, those two publications have tried to bite off more than they can chew.  I sincerely pity those journalists who, to keep body and soul together, have to work for them.  They deserve better, as does the Montenegrin public, which is in dire need of media decontamination.  I hope that the legal proceedings, which I am instigating against the Nedjeljni zurnal, will provide at least a modest contribution to this long overdue decontamination.

This last part was somewhat tongue-in-cheek, of course, but the effect was wonderful.  I also read my letter to Prime Minister Djukanovic of July 11, inviting him to deny that the information on my alleged threat against him came from his cabinet.  I pointed out to him that he would be tainted with the same brush as the Nedjeljni zurnal if he did not do so.

Reports of my press conference, including extensive video clips of the statement, were carried by all three main TV channels in Montenegro in their evening-news broadcasts on Tuesday—even by the state-run TVCG1, which had viciously attacked me, Ron Hatchett, and Joe Bissett only a week earlier.  The dailies reported the statement prominently on Wednesday—with the notable exception of the rabidly separatist Vijesti, partly financed by George Soros’s Open Society network.  Even Pobjeda did so without any attempt to soften the blow through editorial creativity.

After the press conference, I went to the Security Center of Podgorica to report the threat I received on Monday.  The last item of the day was to sign power of attorney over to Milorad Ivanovic, Podgorica’s foremost lawyer and former chief legal counsel of the Yugoslav federal government.  He will sue the Nedjel-jni zurnal for slander, defamation, and all the rest of what the Montenegrin penal code provides for in these circumstances.  I have a good mind to take them to the cleaners or close them for good.  He will also sue the state of Montenegro because its Agency for National Security had leaked the file on my alleged threat to Djukanovic to the media instead of forwarding it to the state prosecutor or to the police, the only two authorized recipients of such material.

Djukanovic’s Montenegro is not fit to be accepted into “Europe” or any other institution that claims to uphold democracy and human rights.  I would still welcome a frank but respectful debate with the proponents of Montenegrin separatism.  So far, I have not encountered any willing interlocutors.  Perhaps they do exist, but for as long as they allow the upholders of thuggery and muggery to dominate the public discourse, their cause will remain tainted by lies and criminality.

After a tense but fruitful day in Podgorica, I returned to Trebinje just in time for the SS. Peter & Paul evening liturgy at a cave church in the hills above this lovely Herzegovinian city.  A six-mile hike there and back, crowned by a spectacular sunset, was followed by a dinner with Bishops Grigorije and Atanasije at the nearby monastery.  The evening was fresh, after a hot, dry day.  The air was fragrant with lavender and rosemary.  The wine was deep ruby red; the food, simple but hearty; life was good.  The first good night’s sleep in days was ahead of me.